


pleasant mornings

by ryswell



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Domestic Fluff, F/M, and they all lived happily ever after the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-23
Updated: 2018-09-23
Packaged: 2019-07-16 05:33:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16079480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryswell/pseuds/ryswell
Summary: Arya and Willas have been wed for years now and still he can’t say no to her.Inspired by the prompt ‘I can deny you nothing’ on asoiafrarepair’s tumblr!





	pleasant mornings

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of my UWS AU but it isn’t necessary to read that series to understand this one. Just know that Ned and Cat have two other kids after Rickon.

She brushes young William’s thick hair, listening carefully as he recites the phrases he has been learning in Valyrian. Willas reads whatever letters arrived overnight while Robyn reads her book. It is all so comfortable, average, boring - nothing like Arya would have wanted, once.

 

After years of basic rations and sleepless nights and complete and utter darkness, the thought of having a stable, happy family never even passed her mind. Yet here she is.

 

“There, sweet, your hair is combed,” Arya tells her smiling son, who immediately moves to play with his toy soldiers. Really he should be getting dressed for visiting the Sept but truly, Arya would rather spend time with her family. Robyn squeals when a wooden carriage runs over her little toe and Arya hides her laugh to chide William. Knowing justice has been served, Robyn happily goes back to her book of popular children’s stories from the Free Cities, a gift from Sansa’s goodmother.

 

She remembers nights spent by the fire with her brothers and sisters, listening to their father’s calm voice tell them stories of heroes and monsters. (Of course, they would later realise these were more fact than fiction but then, they were just children.)

 

Robyn didn’t read many Northern stories - understandable, given that she would be Queen of the Reach and not the North - but what mother didn’t want her children to know of her heritage and culture? Indeed Robyn had a Northern name and there had been William Starks but in all else her children were Reachen, from their looks to enthusiasm of tourneys. They knew their Aunt Margaery better than they did Sansa or Lysara, unfortunately.

 

And they knew all of their uncles very little. Garlan died during the war and Loras shortly after, while Robb, Rickon and Osric were up North and Bran in the Riverlands.

 

Neither of her children had see Winterfell and that made her heart ache, just a little. Arya wonders if this is how her mother felt all those years (Lady Catelyn was in the Riverlands with Bran now, though), having her children not knowing where she grew up.

 

The dread of taking her children to nearly the other side of Westeros, all the shouts and tears that would come with it but... she wanted Robyn to see a true weirwood and William to play in snow that reached his shoulders. To have her children see her old childhood room, where she first learned to ride and where her father was buried, would make Arya so happy and proud.

 

“Willas,” she began. “Do you think perhaps after your lady mother’s nameday we might take the children up North?”

 

The many years they’d been wed showed not only in the lines in their faces or their thinning hair but also in how well they knew each other. Willas’ eyes sparkled and his head titled that way only when he was interested, surprised and in agreement all at once.

 

Robyn and William were looking at him too, almost hopefully. They’d never expressed a great wish to visit the North but they had always been fascinated by Arya’s stories.

 

“I know your brother Robb’s heiress is getting married in some moons,” Willas considers, knowing full well the children hung onto his every word. It was true that Eddara Stark was wedding King Mance’s son and from what Robb wrote it was a love match. “We should need to set out before my mother’s nameday... but she has seen so many now that it won’t make much difference, I hope.”

 

William giggles and Robyn gasps, not realising Willas is teasing. Then her eyes widen. “Shall I meet my Northern cousins?” When Willas nods - giving Arya an amused look - both children squeal.

 

That excites Arya too - she hasn’t seen any of her siblings in too long and has only met a few of her nieces and nephews. Last she saw Eddara she was learning to write, now she was a woman grown about to wed. Robb and Allyria have three other daughters, Sansa and Quentyn had three children (though Arya does see them occasionally) Bran and Bethany had five - and then there was Rickon and Lysara and

 

“It seems I can deny you nothing,” Willas says with a Tyrell smirk as their children discuss all they know of their cousins. Arya can only grin, leaning over to kiss Willas’ cheek. He shall adore the North too, Arya knows, especially when it is not ruined by the Others.


End file.
